This nothing is an all. This _punctum_ without
dimensions is a _punctum saliens_. What is the acorn but the oak which
has lost its branches, its leaves, its trunk, and its roots--that is to
say, all its apparatus, its forms, its particularities--but which is
still present in concentration, in essence, in a force which contains
the possibility of complete revival?
This impoverishment, then, is only superficially a loss, a reduction. To
be reduced to those elements in one which are eternal, is indeed to die
but not to be annihilated: it is simply to become virtual again.
October 9, 1880. (_Clarens_).--A walk. Deep feeling and admiration.
Nature was so beautiful, so caressing, so poetical, so maternal. The
sunlight, the leaves, the sky, the bells, all said to me--"Be of good
strength and courage, poor bruised one. This is nature's kindly season;
here is forgetfulness, calm, and rest. Faults and troubles, anxieties
and regrets, cares and wrongs, are but one and the same burden. We make
no distinctions; we comfort all sorrows, we bring peace, and with us is
consolation. Salvation to the weary, salvation to the afflicted,
salvation to the sick, to sinners, to all that suffer in heart, in
conscience, and in body. We are the fountain of blessing; drink and
live! God maketh his sun to rise upon the just and upon the unjust.
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